DeWet Du Toit, a 24-year-old South African man obsessed with Tarzan, spends his days swinging on vines and tree branches, riding elephants and eating fruits of the bush, just like his celluloid hero.

He traveled to England where he worked as a security guard and delivery driver for a year, but returned to his native South Africa where he exchanged the uniform for a loin cloth and decided to become a real-life Tarzan. DeWet Du Toit became a fan of the jungle warrior as a child, when he lived in Namibia and his father collected Tarzan books and comics. Over the years, he realized he is like his hero in so many ways – his best friend is an elephant called Shaka and he spends more time with monkeys, zebras and crocodiles than he spends with people. Although DeWet admits some people might think he’s crazy, he says he knows this is what he was born to do.

This Tarzan-wannabe isn’t the partying type, and instead of getting drunk in clubs every weekend, he spends three days a week living in the jungle around his hometown of George, making platforms in trees to keep safe from leopards and snakes on the ground, swinging on vines, or eating wild fruits and insects. He began training in the art of being Tarzan, in 2007 and says his made serious progress. So serious, in fact, that he’s been contacted by people in the US about making an appearance at a Tarzan convention. Sure it’s not the Hollywood career he’s been dreaming about, but it’s a start. DeWet Du Toit even videotapes his jungle adventures in the hopes that someone might recognize his talents and offer him the role of Tarzan in a real motion picture.

When he’s not living like Tarzan in the jungle, the unemployed bodybuilder lives with his family, and helps his father put up fences around their ranch.